iCloud.com to Offer at Least Some of MobileMe's Web Functionality

[MacRumors]

While Apple's iCloud introduction at WWDC offered a lot of new information, Apple has been quiet as to exactly what this means to the future of MobileMe's web apps such as email and calendar. In fact, it took a Steve Jobs email to find out the fate of Apple's iWeb hosting services.

Today, ThisisMyNext posted a somewhat controversial clarification they received from Apple PR indicating that MobileMe's web apps will no longer be maintained come June 30th, 2012.

Let’s be clear about what happens when iCloud goes live — according to what was described on stage at the event, and what I’ve confirmed with Apple PR — the service will effectively replace the current web offerings of MobileMe. That means that when the cutoff date of June 30, 2012 comes around for users, the web-based email client, calendar, contacts app, and other components of the web suite will cease to exist.

But it seems that isn't the entire story. Apple has already started mirroring at least some of the existing MobileMe functionality on iCloud.com as well.

One reader was able to send themselves a Calendar invitation in iOS 5 and found themselves linked to the iCloud.com domain. The invite (pictured below) is visually identical to current MobileMe invitations but carries the iCloud branding and is hosted on the iCloud.com domain:




Following this iCloud link shows an iCloud based error page in the same theme.

So, Apple does appear to be working on the web support interface for iCloud but isn't ready yet to talk about it, and at least some of the functionality appears to be based on the existing MobileMe codebase.


Article Link: iCloud.com to Offer at Least Some of MobileMe's Web Functionality

 

[ten-oak-druid]

I said before that I don't accept the rumor of Apple doing away with all mobileme features.

Gallery for instance is very integrated into iOS devices including the AppleTV. It is a selling point for imovie too (especially on iOS devices).

And as for storage space for a web site and idisk, will it really overwhelm the new icloud facility to continue offering every user 20GB of space for this? I mean what is 20GB on top of an entire music and video library?

 

[puckhead193]

all of my personal emails are from mobile me/dot mac. Switching all my emails i get from stores, banks, people etc is going to be a pain in the butt (which is why i always renewed my dot me/mobile me account) I would like to know what is going on with the mail part.

I also like idisk. I could easily send larges file to work if the FTP wasn't working for some reason. It was so simple.

 

[Meriana]

That was to be expected, webmail, contacts and calendar online is a MUST today if they want to keep up with th competition.

Maybe they will even offer photogaleries, blogs withn the 5GB server space each user has.

And i still hope for mx dns records, i'd pay good cash for those.

 

[akm3]

all of my personal emails are from mobile me/dot mac. Switching all my emails i get from stores, banks, people etc is going to be a pain in the butt (which is why i always renewed my dot me/mobile me account) I would like to know what is going on with the mail part.

I also like idisk. I could easily send larges file to work if the FTP wasn't working for some reason. It was so simple.

Get DropBox, it's as simple to share files, and it works better than iDisk AND it works on any Windows machines you use, too.

I'll send you a PM with a referral code that will give you free extra space, too.

 

[macse30]

I would like to know what is going on with the mail part.

This. What happens to mobileme email accounts?

 

[Meriana]

all of my personal emails are from mobile me/dot mac. Switching all my emails i get from stores, banks, people etc is going to be a pain in the butt (which is why i always renewed my dot me/mobile me account) I would like to know what is going on with the mail part.

I also like idisk. I could easily send larges file to work if the FTP wasn't working for some reason. It was so simple.

Current iCloud beta does indicate that it'll be possible to migrate any existing MobileMe accounts to iCloud. You'll be able to use your .me/.mac emails forever for free.

 

[juicedropsdeuce]

Wait.
Who the heck is Sam Gabbay?

 

[elppa]

Get DropBox, it's as simple to share files, and it works better than iDisk AND it works on any Windows machines you use, too.

Dropbox works better than iDisk, agreed. But minor correction: iDisk works with Windows. You can mount it like any other drive. It's just WebDAV.

 

[Satori]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3_3 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8J2 Safari/6533.18.5)

all of my personal emails are from mobile me/dot mac. Switching all my emails i get from stores, banks, people etc is going to be a pain in the butt (which is why i always renewed my dot me/mobile me account) I would like to know what is going on with the mail part.

I also like idisk. I could easily send larges file to work if the FTP wasn't working for some reason. It was so simple.

Apple have clearly stated that mobile me & dotMac addresses will remain after the switchover and be accessed through icloud.

 

[Jeaz]

I don't mind them dropping iDisk as it's not that great compared to Dropbox anyways, and "Documents in the cloud" will give me pretty much all I need iDisk for anyways, however not having any form of webmail of the me.com mails would be a huge drawback.

For instance, my Mrs doesn't own an iPhone or iPad, but still got a MobileMe account from our family account. She does own an iPod Touch and can read it from there, but mostly, like at work, she'll use the webmail. The webmail is really a slow and horrible mess tbh, but still better than nothing.

Also, when being abroad you'd like to avoid roaming. So, imo, removing all web versions of me.com would be a big mistake.
Sure, as long at it's still IMAP based you could do your own hosting, but still.

 

[Dr McKay]

So will iCloud mean there is no way to access emails via a web browser? I sometimes use my emails at work, since it looks unprofessional of me sat at my desk browsing my phone, as least with me.com I can be looking like I'm working. Or have it in another tab.

 

[techpr]

This. What happens to mobileme email accounts?

MobileMe Mail will work as normal in iCloud. You can use you @me.com address or open a new free @me.com one.

 

[Canubis]

I am so hoping for an iCloud Pro from Apple, continue charging me money and giving me the service I deserve therefor. Seriously.
My mobileme email box nowadays weighs in at 2.3 GB and my iDisk comes as nearly 10GB. How should that fit into a future free iCloud account? Plus, you definitely want to compete with Google when releasing iCloud - without a web access to my emails? Please, you're not serious about that, are you?

Here is a customer willing to give you some money. Listen to him!

 

[Anonymous Freak]

I can't view the video while at work - but when I watched it, it sounded VERY much like the web apps would live on as iCloud web apps. The only four that I took as "guaranteed" were the four that were just updated recently: Email, calendar, address book, and Find My (Device).

I use MobileMe gallery for a lot of sharing, and my personal website has been hosted on Apple's service since it was iTools a long time ago - the current one an iWeb design.

But, nowadays, most of my 'sharing' is on sites like Facebook, Flickr, YouTube, and the like. So I guess Apple just sees the writing on the wall that "personal websites" are effectively disappearing. But it does abandon a lot of people who have been using iTools/.Mac/MobileMe for 'hobby websites' or small business websites. (There are quite a few independent Mac software developers who still use MobileMe-hosted sites as their primary website!)

The big blow to me is that I host my personal domain's website on MobileMe, and use the iDisk integration to have a "Media" folder for random stuff I want to post to the web. (i.e. mydomain.com/Media/file.jpg ) THAT will be a loss, since I've been posting crap (to forums and the like) using that forever. Now I need to find a new cheap/free/somethingI'mAlreadyPayingFor place to host that I can use the same URL for. (Since that will break a *LOT* of old forums posts, if I can't use the same domain/URL.)

 

[ThisIsNotMe]

Hrm....

Definitely some MobileMe magic being used.

 

[Saturnine]

I never, for a second, thought that there *wouldn't* be a web-based e-mail app for @me.com addresses. Didn't even cross my mind.

 

[Meriana]

I am so hoping for an iCloud Pro from Apple, continue charging me money and giving me the service I deserve therefor. Seriously.
My mobileme email box nowadays weighs in at 2.3 GB and my iDisk comes as nearly 10GB. How should that fit into a future free iCloud account? Plus, you definitely want to compete with Google when releasing iCloud - without a web access to my emails? Please, you're not serious about that, are you?

Here is a customer willing to give you some money. Listen to him!

ICloud disk space seems to be upgradable, atleast the option in IOS 5 beta already exists ( not working yet though).

 

[Spanky Deluxe]

I wish Apple would release some clarification on what'll happen to existing iWeb sites. Both myself and my mother-in-law-to-be use iWeb and MobileMe to host our websites and one of the reasons I got her to switch to Mac was because of how easy iWeb was to create simple good looking web presences with.

Does all of this mean that our iWeb MobileMe hosted sites will simply cease to exist come the switchover? Neither she nor I have the time to redo our websites in a clunky html editor. I thought the days of having to use the likes of Dreamweaver were behind me.

 

[Sora]

Get DropBox, it's as simple to share files, and it works better than iDisk AND it works on any Windows machines you use, too.

Hate dropbox the interface and usability is not as intuitive as iDisk. I got a beta invite, gave it a 1 year run, but it failed miserably.

Dropbox has yet to mature and really bake into a great cloud based service. Just my opinion.

 

[dfs]

Apple Webmail

I have a MobileMe account and normally don't use the Webmail alternative, but sometimes I do when I'm on the road. I don't worry much about Apple retaining it: I've read somewhere that the OS backup partition for Lion will also contain Safari so that the user can access help files, etc., and also can use Webmail until he gets his system up and running again. If true, this would imply that Apple has long-range plans for Webmail.

 

[PsyD4Me]

can I keep my @mac email addy? i don't need anything fresh like @iCloud

 

[manu chao]

Dropbox works better than iDisk, agreed. But minor correction: iDisk works with Windows. You can mount it like any other drive. It's just WebDAV.

It works 'partly', at least compared to Dropbox which caches local copies of all your files. Mounting a WebDAV volume does not automatically caches its contents locally (unless you are savvy enough to install and configure a syncing app on Windows which does this).

Hate dropbox the interface and usability is not as intuitive as iDisk. I got a beta invite, gave it a 1 year run, but it failed miserably.

What interface? There is no interface, it is just a normal folder on your computer.

I wish Apple would release some clarification on what'll happen to existing iWeb sites.

Apple has clarified this perfectly well, until July 2012, nothing changes.
Expecting any kind of assurances beyond one year for cloud services is just unrealistic. These things evolve constantly and everything is always 'subject to change'.

 

[uk1simon]

Alias Email

just a thought, I also use my alias email's for shopping, subscriptions etc. I hope I can keep these with the migration!

 

[CrackedButter]

I commented on the original story from thisismynext.com

I thought it would be crazy if apple DIDN'T have a web front end. Just because Apple never mentioned anything, didn't mean it wasn't going to exist. It would be such a backwards move on Apple's part considering their heritage.

The iPhone wasn't mentioned at WWDC, doesn't mean there isn't one coming out.

So while Josh does make some other interesting points in his article, I think he might have reached too far on this one.